


Stay safe. Eat cake.

by NamelesslyNightlock



Category: Avengers Assemble (Cartoon), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bickering, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, Kidnapping, Loki (Marvel) Does What He Wants, M/M, Secret Relationship, Steve Rogers Is a Good Bro, Steve Rogers-centric, Tony Stark Has A Heart, loki is a little shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 02:29:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15571707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NamelesslyNightlock/pseuds/NamelesslyNightlock
Summary: “You were ignoring me,” the trickster sniffed, actually pointing his nose in the air with a dignified, if slightly whiny sneer. “I had to get your attention somehow.”“And you didn’t think to call?” Tony asked incredulously. “I can’t believe that your first thought was to kidnap Captain America.“





	Stay safe. Eat cake.

**Author's Note:**

> This one is aa because that universe is just so pure and I needed that rn
> 
> would you believe I wrote this in the four hours after I posted the latest chapter of Midgard Offensive? It was finished at about 2am (which probably accounts for the plot tbh) ~~how am I writing catharsis fic for my iw catharsis fic, what the hell have I done to myself~~
> 
> So yeah. This is dedicated to everyone who put up with Ch11. I was reading your comments while writing this so the happiness that gave me bolstered this nonsense. I hope you enjoy it!

When Steve blinked his eyes open to a blurred view of dark hair and a sharp smirk, he honestly considered pretending to be unconscious again.

It wasn’t that he was afraid of Loki– it was more that his last memory was of tripping over a well-placed root on his morning run, and either the fall or whatever his kidnapper had done to him had left him with a roaring headache. Again, by itself, a headache was nothing that Steve was incapable of dealing with but Loki had a well-earned reputation for being a bit of a chatterer– and it never was just talk. With the god of lies it was always a game, his words twisting like a lethal puzzle while they worked to ensnare their victim in a web that was impossible to untangle.

Tony revelled in it of course, but Steve always found the practice to be tiring. And he most certainly did _not_ want to be dealing with it when his brain felt like it was making a valiant effort to jump from his skull.

Besides– if he remained quiet, there was a possibility that Loki would grow bored and begin talking to himself. It was a very, _very_ slim possibility, but one that Steve’s aching mind was willing to make a run at.

Unfortunately, the trickster caught on to his ruse before Steve could even let out a breath, and he felt a harsh jab at a pressure point above his collarbone. His eyes snapped back open of their own accord, and he met Loki’s entertained gaze with a glare.

When the glare only served to brighten the delight in those poisonous green eyes Steve groaned in defeat, pulling himself straight as best he could. He was tied to a chair– not a hard or uncomfortable monstrosity that he expected from a kidnapping, but rather a padded wooden piece that wouldn’t look out of place as part of a high-end dining set.

In fact—

Steve allowed his gaze to wander, taking in his surroundings. As kidnapping locations went, it wasn’t _too_ bad– the room was dark but not overly so, and Steve could easily see the shelving that lined the walls. The shelves themselves were quite nice, a rich dark mahogany, but the jars they held were a little disconcerting. They were of various sizes and all held a dead creature floating in unidentified liquid– several of which Steve knew he couldn’t possibly name, and a few more that likely didn’t originate from Earth. Still, it was little more than what Steve himself had seen on his visits to some of the various museums around the city. It was _weird_ , but surely not too far afield of what one could expect from a mage that was born on another planet. Steve was hardly one to judge.

The rest of the room was simple and honestly rather pleasant. There were grey flagstones underfoot that looked smooth and worn, and the furniture was all carved from the same dark wood as the shelving. The only exception appeared to be the chair Steve was tied to, but since his chest was also lashed down he didn’t have much of a chance to examine it. All he could see was the black detail on the armrests, and the firm press of new springs in the cushion beneath his buttocks. Despite the darkness and the pickled creatures and _Loki_ , the room itself almost felt… familiar. There was just something about it that nagged at Steve’s mind, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on the specific memory.

So, instead, he focused on the problems of the present, his eyes finding the god who had begun to lean against the wooden desk while he waited for Steve to finish his examination of the room. Steve blinked– he didn’t think he’d ever seen Loki without his helmet before, yet the god before him looked downright causal, wearing only dark wash pants and a green button down.

Sure, okay. Steve figured it was logical that Loki didn’t live in his battle armour. That would probably get rather uncomfortable.

Still, it was unusual even without factoring in Loki’s Midgardian fashion sense. It wasn’t like Loki to be patient– but then, Steve had seen that look on a certain genius friend of his enough times to recognise what it meant.

Loki was just waiting for a captive audience.

_Ha._

Well, he certainly had _that_ , at least.

“What do you want, Loki?” Steve asked bluntly, and as predicted the trickster’s smirk widened at the invitation to speak.

“What do _I_ want?” Loki asked, his fingers pressing together in his lap and somehow giving the illusion of leaning forward despite the fact that he remained reclined against the desk. “I think you’ll find that my own desires are irrelevant in this circumstance. It really comes down to what you and your team want, Captain Rogers.”

Steve sighed, and he really had to fight hard to keep his eyes from rolling to the ceiling. This was exactly the kind of word puzzle nonsense he had been hoping to avoid, and here Loki was, diving right into it at the first opportunity. There was _no_ consideration for the recently awake– which should be especially prudent considering the raging headache Steve still sported.

“Okay,” he said slowly, and the twitch at the corner of Loki’s mouth was all the indication of his inability to keep his voice free from dryness that Steve needed. “So tell me, then. What is it that I and my team want?”

“Please,” Loki replied with a short laugh, pretending not to have noticed Steve’s disinterest in the conversation. “You and I both know that I cannot tell you that. I’m hardly a mind reader.”

Oh for the love of—

“So why don’t you guess?” Steve suggested with false geniality. “You’re good at that, aren’t you?”

Rather than give the response that Steve had been expecting, Loki narrowed his eyes and considered Steve with cool shrewdness. Steve knew that Loki was smart– the cogs were clearly whirring in his mind as he worked his way to the correct conclusion.

And Steve almost sighed.

Damn.

“You’re stalling,” Loki decided, though he seemed far from angry at the revelation.

“What did you expect?” Steve asked, not even willing to _attempt_ the twisting dialogue that would no doubt follow if he tried to deny it. Besides, he _had_ been stalling– the Avengers were surely on their way, after all. He just had to wait.

“The very same, if I am being honest,” Loki admitted. “So tell me… Which of your teammates do you think will come to your rescue first?”

Steve froze. There was a possibility that Loki was asking the question to needle information out of Steve, but it had been accompanied with a perfectly sculpted expression of innocent curiosity that it couldn’t be anything _but_ what Loki was depicting it to be.

Loki’s a damn good liar, true. But in this instance, he was way off the mark if he wanted to keep Steve ignorant of his intentions.

“You’re stalling too,” he said. He knew that he was correct when all Loki did was smirk. There was no need to deny it– he had Steve tied to a chair, after all. If he wanted to stall, all he had to do was _wait_. But if that was the case, it just begged the question– “What are _you_ waiting for?”

“Believe me, Captain Rogers,” Loki said, his smirk widening dangerously. “It will not be long before you find out.”

The possibilities were endless and honestly rather worrying, but Steve made himself think on other things. After all, at least Loki seemed to be in a good mood. Steve had met the trickster on the battlefield enough times to know that this experience could have been _far_ worse.

In the end, Loki turned out to be right. They didn’t have to wait long at all, for after perhaps only a minute of silence another Avenger arrived on the scene.

If Steve had been a gambling man, he probably would have answered Loki’s earlier question with a wager on Tony finding him first. That, however, would be where his winning streak came faltering to a rather disenchanting end. For had he been asked to describe his expectations for his rescue, Steve would have given a detailed account (though of course, not if Loki remained in earshot) of Iron Man crashing through the roof with repulsors blazing, tearing up the joint in a show of firepower and flashy stunts. Tony would then singlehandedly take Loki out before grabbing Steve around the waist and flying him out of there bridal style, whether Steve wanted him to or not.

Instead, Tony entered in a manner not unlike that of a civilised human being, simply pushing open a door to Steve’s left and entering the room with– yes, okay, he still had a touch of his distinctive Dramatic Stark Flare™, but it was at nowhere near the levels that Steve had imagined.

Honestly, Steve figured he should probably just stop trying to predict which direction this kidnapping would go in next.

“What the _hell_ , Loki?” Tony demanded as the door clicked shut behind him. He was wearing a suit, but it wasn’t the one Steve had been expecting him to turn up with. Instead of the familiar scarlet and gold armour his body was covered with dark grey cashmere and a sharp black shirt, his royal blue tie sitting not quite straight at his throat as if it had been jostled in a rush. His only mask was a pair of mauve tinted sunglasses with a wire frame that he slid from his nose as he stalked into the room, his eyes narrowing as he did so as if their dramatic removal were the only reason for wearing them in the first place.

To be honest, Steve hadn’t known what to expect as a response. Every preconceived idea he’d had of kidnappings from both external sources and his own experience had already been thrown out the window – had already been torn to shreds, burned to a crisp, and then smashed by a particularly angry Hulk. So rather than being shocked when Loki didn’t respond with a magical blast, a thrown dagger, or at the very _least_ a cutting insult and instead crossed his arms over his chest like a jilted lover, Steve found himself quite enjoying the show.

“You were ignoring me,” the trickster sniffed, actually pointing his nose in the air with a dignified, if slightly whiny sneer. “I had to get your attention somehow.”

“And you didn’t think to _call?_ ” Tony asked incredulously, his hands spreading by his sides in disbelief as he stepped even further into the room. “I can’t believe that your first thought was to _kidnap Captain America._ “

“Not my _first_ thought, no,” Loki admitted. “However, I know how you tend to ignore your phone if there is a possibility of Miss Potts being on the other end of the line with a request for you to attend a meeting—“

“I do _not—“_

 _“_ And even less of a chance that you’ll notice if you’re with your team—“

“Not true, Cap always makes me—“

“And if you’re in your workshop, the chances of getting hold of you are _negligible_ , since the only thing you hear then is the call to _Assemble—“_

“Okay,” Tony said, “now _that—“_

“And I don’t usually mind that,” Loki interrupted, and the uncharacteristic vulnerability in his expression suggested that, for once, he might actually be telling the truth. “I know that your workshop is a part of who you are, but when our last four dates have been derailed by Avengers’ call outs and I haven’t seen you in over a week—“

“Oh, so _that’s_ why you went after Cap,” Tony murmured like he had solved a great mystery, and Steve was certainly glad to have cleared that up as well. It’s always nice to know that a kidnapping isn’t personal. Less chance of it happening again, that way.

“I do not enjoy being ignored, Anthony,” Loki finished with a huff, and there was something in his tone that made even Tony pause.

Steve had been watching the back and forth with amusement, settling into the chair and almost not noticing the ropes around his wrists as he enjoyed the show. But this felt a whole lot more intimate.

 _Oh god,_ Steve thought. Since when did his lighthearted kidnapping get so serious?

“Hey,” said Tony, stepping closer and reaching out with his left hand. Steve’s eyes widened when it came to rest on Loki’s cheek, Tony’s thumb stroking at the skin there in what had to be soothing circles.

Loki didn’t lean into the touch, but he wasn’t pulling away, either. He watched Tony with assessing eyes, waiting.

“I’m sorry,” Tony said, his voice tender and dripping with sincerity. “I know I should be making more of an effort. And I _want_ to, god I want to, Lokes, but I– no, you know what?” Tony cut himself off and shook his head before placing his free hand to Loki’s other cheek, cupping the Asgardian’s face gently. “There’s not going to be any buts. I really _am_ sorry. I can’t change the Assembles, but I _can_ make more time elsewhere.”

Loki smiled– and it was a different smile from anything Steve had seen so far. This smile lacked all of Loki’s hard edges, the jagged barbs and targeted humour that the god, Steve was realising, often hid behind. This smile was soft and open, and it reached all the way up to his eyes, brightening that green to something less like poison and more like the warmth of spring.

It almost made Loki look _kind_.

“I’ll accept your apology,” the trickster said, the haughtiness in his voice not quite matching his affectionate expression. “But I _do_ expect grovelling later.”

“And I would expect nothing less,” Tony replied, his own smile wide and bright.

Steve felt out of place, an intruder on what was quite clearly a private moment, but he couldn’t bring himself to speak up. He didn’t want to risk shattering the softness of Tony’s expression, the pure adoration that fell from him in waves. Watching them, Steve almost forgot that the men before him were Tony Stark and Loki Laufeyson, that they were the Invincible Iron Man and the Mad Prince of Asgard. In that moment, they were just two people reconnecting after a short period of difficulty, coming together with nothing but fondness and affection between them.

It was as simple as that, and by the time Tony pressed his lips to Loki’s, Steve found that he _had_ been expecting it.

He might have thought it strange, if he had heard about this from another source, or perhaps even if he had seen it in a different situation– but, for now at least, Steve could see how these two men managed to fit into each other’s lives.

“I do have one more question,” Tony said as he disconnected his lips from Loki’s, his eyes gleaming with the mischievous spark that would usually serve to put Steve on guard, but in this context was no doubt a sign that the inventor had managed to find his footing.

“And what’s that?” Loki asked, the previous harshness gone from his voice, leaving it pleasantly light.

“Well…” Tony made a show of looking around the dimly lit room, his eyes lingering on the strange jars on the shelves. “What on Earth have you done to the study?”

“I needed the kidnapping to look real,” Loki said immediately, the answer quite clearly rehearsed. “I could hardly allow Captain Rogers to think I was going _soft—“_

“It’s Snape’s office, isn’t it?” Tony teased. “Admit it, you finally read those books—“

“Oh, _that’s_ what it is,” Steve mused aloud, glancing around with newfound appreciation. It was a wonder he hadn’t realised it before.

To Tony’s credit, he hid the fact that he jumped about a foot in the air with well-practiced dignity.

“Cap,” Tony not-quite-squeaked as he moved to stand in front of Steve. “You’re—“

“Still here, yes,” Steve said cheerfully. “Kidnapping victim, dutifully remaining tied to his chair. Are you going to let me go?”

“Uhm—“

“We can’t let him go _now_ , my dear,” said Loki, stepping behind Tony to wrap his arms around the inventor’s waist, his chin coming to rest on Tony’s shoulder while his lips curled up into a sneer. “Why, just think of everything he’s _seen_.”

Tony blanched.

Steve _tried_ to hold in the laugh, but it appeared that he had reached his limit for the day and it broke free from his lips in a low snicker.

“Oh, please,” he said, his lips twitching. “Please don’t kill me. I promise. Not a word of this will pass my lips.”

“Steve,” Tony groaned, burying his face in his hands.

“I saw nothing,” Steve insisted.

“I don’t think we can trust you,” Tony muttered good-naturedly. 

“I don’t think I can trust _you_ either,” Loki said, turning to Tony. “I am still waiting for my grovelling, Anthony. To think that I went to the lengths of carrying this hero all the way up here—“

“I bet you used magic,” Tony muttered.

“—and for a Midgardian, he isn’t _light_ you know,” Loki added.

“You’re a _god_ ,” Tony complained. “Like that would have even mattered!”

“He was _really_ heavy, Anthony,” said Loki, his green eyes sparkling.

“Fine, fine,” Tony said, waving an arm in defeat. “What do you want?”

Loki grinned smugly. “I think that access to JARVIS would suffice. Not the Avengers’ systems, of course,” Loki added, his eyes darting to Steve for just a moment. “But I would like access to your personal ones, so that I may ensure that your hours in your workshop do not impact your health, and so that I can be properly alerted when your schedule is going to interrupt one of our dates, so that I am not left in a restaurant alone for three hours while you are battling insignificant cretins like the _Serpent Society_.”

Tony winced. “Yeah, sorry about that.”

Despite the clear sympathy in the tone, the diversion tactic was as obvious as Loki and Steve’s had been earlier.

“He really was _quite_ heavy,” Loki repeated sternly, raising a wry eyebrow.

Tony sighed and turned to Steve, his hands on his hips and a glare in his eyes as he looked at Steve like this whole thing was _his_ fault. It might have been intimidating, but the overall impression was quite ruined by the way his lips seemed determined to tug up into a smile.

“You see?” Tony said in an attempt at sternness. “This is why I shouldn’t have to be forced to eat the weird healthy stuff.”

“They’re called vegetables, Tony,” Steve said blandly. He swore that Loki snorted, but when Steve looked over the god remained perfectly composed.

“I know what they’re _called_ ,” Tony said with intentional petulance, unable to stop his grin this time. “I just refuse to give them the dignity of being referred to by their proper title. The only plant worthy of being consumed is coffee– but you’re making me miss my point. _Point_ is that clearly, had you been a bit heavier, maybe Slim Bean over here would have given up carrying you—“

“ _Excuse_ me? _“_ Loki interjected.

“And then you wouldn’t have been kidnapped, and I wouldn’t have had to come and rescue you like a damsel in distress!” Tony spread his arms dramatically, his lips still twitching with mirth. “In conclusion– you need to eat more cake, Cap. It’s safer in the long run.”

There was a pause where Loki pressed his lips together tightly in a show of not-laughing that wasn’t fooling anyone, and where Steve looked between the two in absolute disbelief.

“I don’t see much rescuing happening,” Steve eventually said, deciding that the wisest course of action was to entirely ignore the last half of Tony’s statement.

“Neither do I,” Loki agreed quickly, his eyes gleaming. “Anthony?”

“I’m not carrying you without the suit, Cap,” Tony whined. “We just had this conversation!”

“Are you not going to rescue him, then?” Loki asked curiously.

“You said you wouldn’t let me,” Tony pointed out.

“I might consider it,” Loki said, his shrug far too nonchalant to be anything but carefully choreographed.

“What if I begged?” Tony asked, an expectant tilt to his words.

“You would never beg,” Loki baited. “You are too obstinate.”

From the way that Tony’s eyes lit up, he was clearly aware of what Loki was trying to do– and oh, god, but this put whole new spin on the verbal duels this pair engaged in on the battlefield, and now Steve was never going to be able to fight at Tony’s side against Loki ever– _ever_ again.

“Oh, you know exactly how untrue that is,” Tony leered, unaware of Steve’s disturbing revelation.

Loki grinned, and pressed the tip of his tongue between his front teeth a gesture that was clearly intended to tease.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?" Tony asked, and Steve definitely _didn’t_ like the way his voice deepened—

“Hmm,” Loki considered. “I think I’d like it more if you did it on your knees.”

Tony’s expression lit up like the Rockefeller Christmas tree, and he stepped into Loki’s space with a sly grin slipping onto his lips. The corners of his eyes crinkled with mirth and he was clearly about to respond with something witty, but Loki took the opportunity to lean down and catch Tony’s unspoken answer with a kiss.

Absently, Steve wondered if that meant that Loki had won the verbal spar, but his mind didn’t stay on the topic for long, because—

The kiss, unfortunately, was nothing like the sweet press of lips that the last one had been. It was teeth and tongues and indecent moans, and Steve’s eyes near rolled into the back of his head in his attempt to drown it out.

Something needed to be done, and Steve needed to man up and _do_ it.

“Erm, Tony,” he tried, his voice coming out far weaker than he had planned. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I really would appreciate—“

“Okay, okay,” said Tony, pulling away from Loki by an inch or so. Not enough for Steve to be comfortable being in the same room as them, but enough that there was _some_ space between them, at least. Though Steve couldn’t see either of Tony’s hands and one of Loki’s was suspiciously wedged between their bodies, and Steve was _sure_ it was in his best interests to get out of there with the speed of a rat up a drain pipe. He was immensely relieved, therefore, when Tony jerked his head toward Steve and asked– “Sweetheart, you think you could do something about that?”

Loki rolled his eyes in annoyance, and Steve thought he caught a glimpse of soft fondness in the expression. But before he could properly look, Loki was waving a glowing green hand in his direction—

God, but _that_ almost gave Steve a heart attack—

—and then Steve was sitting on the couch in his room in Avengers Tower, his wrists and chest free from bindings and not even chafed in the slightest. It was as if none of it had ever happened.

“Welcome back, Captain Rogers,” said JARVIS, his voice laced with the joviality of an early riser on their first cup of caffeine. “How was your run this morning?”

For a moment, Steve was thrown. (He would blame it on the headache, he decided.) But then he remembered JARVIS’ rather… _unique_ sense of humour, and shot a dry look up at the ceiling. “You knew where I was the whole time, didn’t you?” Steve groaned.

“I can neither confirm nor deny any association with Mr Laufeyson,” JARVIS said cheerfully, and Steve couldn’t help but chuckle. The AI most definitely took after his creator, for even in following the order of silence he had no doubt received from Tony, JARVIS had still managed to answer the question.

Steve would be lying if he didn’t admit to briefly entertaining the thought of alerting the other Avengers to Tony’s arrangement with a certain placeholder on SHIELD’s most wanted list, but—

Really, it wasn’t doing anyone any harm. If anything, Loki had looked calmer, more relaxed than Steve had _ever_ seen him before. And if Tony’s presence was the cause of that, then how could Steve risk putting a stop to it? Besides, Tony had seemed _happy_ , and for that, at least, Steve was content with keeping things as they were.

The Avengers could find out in their own time.

And if Steve took the elevator up to Tony’s penthouse later that day to compare his memory of the chair he had been tied to with the incomplete set in Tony’s unused dining room?

Well.

Steve knew how to keep a secret.

**Author's Note:**

> AND THEN THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER AND THERE WAS NOT A SINGLE SPECK OF ANGST IN THEIR LIVES EVER AGAIN


End file.
